Govt yet to appoint chairmen of district committees

PTI leaders pushing to get their people appointed as heads of zakat, market, price control committees

RAWALPINDI: The Punjab government has yet to appoint chairmen for 28 committees in 30 various districts of the provinces including Rawalpindi even after a lapse of 13 months.

The important civic bodies like zakat, bait-ul maal, market and price control committees remain headless so far due to which their work has suffered substantially.

The appointments on these seats are made by the government on the recommendation of deputy commissioner of the district.

However, nominations for the chairmen of the said committees sent by deputy commissioner offices have been rejected twice owing to serious conflicts between members of the provincial assembly, provincial ministers and parliamentary secretaries, sources said.

According to sources, some people in power want to appoint their favourite people on the seats of district committee chairmen. Though there are not much pay and perks attached with zakat committee or price committee chairmen and such, they tend to have strong political clout.

Therefore some provincial ministers are reportedly in a serious row with a federal minister over the appointment of zakat and bait-ul maal district chairmen for Rawalpindi. With these headless bodies, people deserving zakat or assistance from bait-ul maal, including orphans and widows are miserably affected.

Similarly, the absence of the chairman for the price-control committee has led to an increase in profiteering and hoarding practices in the markets. Other committees working without chairmen include the neighbourhood crime control committee, ittehad bait-ul muslimeen committee, overseas committee, district food vigilance committee, district jail committee and market committee.

Leaders of PTI and its elected representatives are reportedly facing conflict on the appointment of the chairmen of said committees, while central and provincial party leaders have completely failed to resolve the issue. According to reports, party members, businessmen and local leaders, so far quite due to political pressure, have started criticising the party leadership now openly for failing to appoint district committees’ chairmen after a lapse of over a year.

Some of those raising voices on the issue have been compensated through promises for appointments at the tehsil, city and cantonment area offices. PTI members of the provincial assembly have endorsed the view that there are conflicts pertaining to appointment of chairmen for district committees.

The provincial authorities have however started some work for appointing of heads for 1,166 zakat committees in Rawalpindi following the completion of three-month tenure of the outgoing administrators.

As per sources, the selection process for the new administrators will be completed within a month. The deputy commissioner of Rawalpindi had temporarily appointed 1,166 administrators for zakat committee meant for identifying the deserving widows, orphans and destitute people for receiving zakat in Ramazan. In addition to monetary support, the committees also distribute gifts and sustenance allowance to their recipients.

After completion of their office tenure, the committees are now filling the posts of chairmen and members. However, the process is seeing disputes among local leaders of ruling PTI as all battle to appoint their people on the local committees.

On the other side, city presidents of Pakistan Peoples Party Babar Jadoon and PML-N Maqbool Ahmed Khan have alleged that the chairmen for the local committees are hired on the basis of nepotism rather than popular voting. As per law, they maintain, the committee chairmen must be appointed through local polls conducted in designated mosques. According to PPP’s Jadoon, PTI leadership in Rawalpindi is using backdoor tactics for the appointment of zakat committee chairmen which he intends to challenge in the high court.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 14^th, 2019.